Torn and Repaired Meniscus - thoughts/input - When can i climb again?!?

JCM wrote:

You ought to be able to high step again. I tore my  meniscus in a high step almost exactly 10 years ago. Had the repair surgery. It was about 4 months until I could climb, and about a year for the knee to feel 100%. From that point on, no concerns or limitations. It's my good knee now.  Though I was 23 at the time if surgery, so that helped.

One major factor for me has been hip mobility. I find if my hips are tight, that messes up the biomechanics of the high step and stresses the knee more. This may have contributed to my original injury - forcing a high step outside the range of my hip mobility. If the mobility is sorted through the whole chain, especially at the hip, the high step feels a lot safer for the knee.

The 4 months of recovery time feels like forever, in the moment, but on the scale of a climbing career it is just a blip. You'll be back as capable as ever.

I’m a very stiff climber, and I feel that a lack of flexibility had something to do with the injury. Thank you for the response! I figured I could really benefit from more yoga and mobility/ flexibility especially in the hips.

Peter Graupner wrote:

The only thing I’m worried about after I start to heal, is if I’ll ever be able to high step confidentiality again. I’m short and I’ve always depended on that move. However like a lot of things in life we adapt and find other ways to solve the problem.

It will take time, but I’m sure you will regain the confidence to trust that knee on high steps, and all sorts of other knee-intensive moves.

It took me about a year to stop thinking about my knee on every scary/funky move. Just realized that it would be 9 years this summer since my knee surgery. 

Peter Graupner wrote:

The only thing I’m worried about after I start to heal, is if I’ll ever be able to high step confidentiality again. I’m short and I’ve always depended on that move. However like a lot of things in life we adapt and find other ways to solve the problem.

I knew my "bucket handle" tear in my meniscus was caused by a high step. It was not even strenuous and I did not feel anything while doing the move, and only could not weigh my leg after I got lowered down on the ground. Now that it has recovered (without surgery), I am VERY mindful of what kind of moves I put my knee through. I still do high steps, but am careful with the muscle engagement. I have no problem backing off a move if I feel any danger of damage -- it's just not worth it. Good luck with your recovery.

why no bouldering as opposed to toprope or trad?

Thanks for starting this thread. I'm dealing with a medial meniscus tear in my right knee and waiting for my orthopedic appointment to see if surgery or conservative route is best. There was a lot of information here that I hadn't considered. Lots more research I need to do before my appointment! 

Degenerative or complex tears may do better w conservative care. I’m 1 year + from a complex medial horn tear. I’ve had a few setbacks but getting close to being fully back without surgery. My advice is if locks up on you get surgery. If not consider conservative care including cycling 

https://bmcmusculoskeletdisord.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12891-021-04632-8

Your doctor told you 6 months and now you’re asking “the internet” for a second opinion?? Just listen to your doctor and don’t f**k your knee up. I’m on my third ACL reconstruction and I can assure you that climbing doesn’t matter as much as you think it does. Play some videos games, learn to shred on a guitar, and do some hangboard. Hang in there.

I'm 37 and I've just found out I have a bucket tear in the lateral meniscus. Like many people here it happened doing a high step. Going in for a repair on Thursday and i've been fore warned that there is always a chance the repair may not heal and if that happens I will need to have it removed :( on the plus side my surgeon did say out of the 80 he has done in the last year only 2 haven't healed and have required removal.

As for activity he said I wouldn't be doing any strenuous activity to make sure the sutures stay in place to give the meniscus the best possible chance of healing. He said I am looking at about 4 months before I am looking at doing any climbing. 

Luckily I also love cycling and I can do that around 8 weeks, which is a big relief. My biggest obstacle is going to be not devouring bags of M&M's and gaining 10 KG!

I'll update here after my surgery and throughout my recovery in case any one else facing this needs info for now or the future! 

Darren French wrote:

I've just found out I have a bucket tear in the lateral meniscus. Like many people here it happened doing a high step. Going in for a repair on Thursday and i've been fore warned that there is always a chance the repair may not heal and if that happens I will need to have it removed :( on the plus side my surgeon did say out of the 80 he has done in the last year only 2 haven't healed and have required removal.

As for activity he said I wouldn't be doing any strenuous activity to make sure the sutures stay in place to give the meniscus the best possible chance of healing. He said I am looking at about 4 months before I am looking at doing any climbing. 

Luckily I also love cycling and I can do that around 8 weeks, which is a big relief. My biggest obstacle is going to be not devouring bags of M&M's and gaining 10 KG!

I'll update here after my surgery and throughout my recovery in case any one else facing this needs info for now or the future!

Hey man I’m sorry to hear this.. however welcome to the club. I had the exact injury, and had the repair. That was in February, and I’m carefully climbing again. I firmly believe that we can come back from some injuries stronger than ever. While I was recovering I started to lifts weights for the first time in my life, and it was one of the best things I’ve done. I felt strong as fuck when I started to climbing again. It also taught me to be patient and take my time. I really took the advice from other climbs here to follow through with PT and that was the most critical part of recovery. Anyway I hope you come back incredibly strong.

Peter Graupner wrote:

Hey man I’m sorry to hear this.. however welcome to the club. I had the exact injury, and had the repair. That was in February, and I’m carefully climbing again. I firmly believe that we can come back from some injuries stronger than ever. While I was recovering I started to lifts weights for the first time in my life, and it was one of the best things I’ve done. I felt strong as fuck when I started to climbing again. It also taught me to be patient and take my time. I really took the advice from other climbs here to follow through with PT and that was the most critical part of recovery. Anyway I hope you come back incredibly strong.

Funny you mention lifting weights. I took a break from climbing and lifted weights for 6 months when my GF snapped her ACL and she had to have a reconstruction. When I finally did go back to climbing I was a lot stronger too. This is my plan this time around. Cycle to work once I am able to and join the gym there and just focus on PT and strength. I probably wont touch a climbing wall for 6 months tbh. I just keep having to tell myself that 6 months really isn't that long in the grand scheme of things!

Darren French wrote:

Funny you mention lifting weights. I took a break from climbing and lifted weights for 6 months when my GF snapped her ACL and she had to have a reconstruction. When I finally did go back to climbing I was a lot stronger too. This is my plan this time around. Cycle to work once I am able to and join the gym there and just focus on PT and strength. I probably wont touch a climbing wall for 6 months tbh. I just keep having to tell myself that 6 months really isn't that long in the grand scheme of things!

SURGERY IS OVER! He was able to repair it and it went really well. Some info about my injury for any one who finds there way here looking for more info:

- I had an 80% tear of the lateral meniscus in my right knee

- The injury happened on 13th October and surgery took place 27th October. For anyone not good at maths that's 14 days   

- Due to how quickly the operation took place the tissue was in really good condition despite the sizeable tear

- Due to the good condition of the tissue the surgeon is confident it should heal well.

- I am in a knew brace which will be adjusted every 2 weeks until it comes off in 6 weeks time. 

So far everything is looking really good!

I'm in the orthopedic surgeon's waiting room right now looking to get my other knee scoped. 

Being old sucks 

Update, no surgery. Dr said if I wasn't so active he would recommend NOT doing surgery since it's not that bad, but because I'm so active and I do sketchy stuff like rock climbing and the knee occasionally "catches" he left the choice up to me. I was going to have him scope my knee but turns out his first available surgery date wasn't till mid December and I don't want to miss ski season so he busted out a long ass needle full of ooze and steroids and shot me up right there and wrote me a prescription for physical therapy. So I'll revisit this next summer and if I need to I'll schedule for next early Nov. Nov/Dec kinda suck on the east coast so if I have to miss fun, that's when to do it.
He said some people have great luck with the shot and PT, we'll see. Looking forward to the PT, the office is a minute away and they stretch me out 3 times a week, and I'm lazy about doing that myself :)

On May 17th of this year I tore my meniscus and mcl high stepping on a boulder. The doctor recommended I go for a repair because I am young (23) and also very active he said it was my best chance for long term knee function if it held. So on June 21st I got a medial meniscus repair. Lucky for me my mcl was able to heal on its own so no surgery for that. As far as recovery goes it went about like this for me.

Weeks 0-6 I was in a locked brace aloud to weight bare as tolerated as long as the brace was locked straight.

Weeks 6-9 No more brace started Pt by the 9th week I was able to walk maybe a mile or so before getting pretty worked. Biking helped a lot in this stage.

Weeks 9-12 much better at walking in this stage felt like it really started to happen naturally again. Started working on stairs and swimming a lot. By the 12th week I was pretty solid going up stairs but going down was still not happening atleast not normally. Also started hitting the gym doing stuff like bench press military press basically anything that didn’t stress my leg out to much.

At 16 weeks i had remastered stairs. I started doing squats, lunges, leg press, and light jogging. Also started doing some mellow hiking, when you start I’d recommend some trekking poles they helped me a lot going down hill. My leg started to hurt a bit for maybe a week after starting these workouts.

Right now I’m at 18 weeks almost 19 and a few days ago I did my first rock climb since the injury! All on tr and stuff that was pretty mellow for me. Although I will say slab and lower angle stuff was much more difficult than steep/ vert climbing. I had a hard time on this 5.8 slab but then was able to climb this steep 5.11 much easier just cause I didn’t have to weight my feet as much. 

My doc said I could start easing into climbing at 5 months. I did start slightly early but I’ve been using pain as my guide and if anything feels weird or not right I’ll back off right away. I’ll post another update in a couple months to let y’all know how it’s doing after I’m fully back to climbing. To anyone going thru this hang in there it’s not so bad once you hit the 2 month mark. Get on the hang board and stay fit and you’ll bounce back even stronger. Good luck y’all 

Matt Pena wrote:

On May 17th of this year I tore my meniscus and mcl high stepping on a boulder. The doctor recommended I go for a repair because I am young (23) and also very active he said it was my best chance for long term knee function if it held. So on June 21st I got a medial meniscus repair. Lucky for me my mcl was able to heal on its own so no surgery for that. As far as recovery goes it went about like this for me.

Weeks 0-6 I was in a locked brace aloud to weight bare as tolerated as long as the brace was locked straight.

Weeks 6-9 No more brace started Pt by the 9th week I was able to walk maybe a mile or so before getting pretty worked. Biking helped a lot in this stage.

Weeks 9-12 much better at walking in this stage felt like it really started to happen naturally again. Started working on stairs and swimming a lot. By the 12th week I was pretty solid going up stairs but going down was still not happening atleast not normally. Also started hitting the gym doing stuff like bench press military press basically anything that didn’t stress my leg out to much.

At 16 weeks i had remastered stairs. I started doing squats, lunges, leg press, and light jogging. Also started doing some mellow hiking, when you start I’d recommend some trekking poles they helped me a lot going down hill. My leg started to hurt a bit for maybe a week after starting these workouts.

Right now I’m at 18 weeks almost 19 and a few days ago I did my first rock climb since the injury! All on tr and stuff that was pretty mellow for me. Although I will say slab and lower angle stuff was much more difficult than steep/ vert climbing. I had a hard time on this 5.8 slab but then was able to climb this steep 5.11 much easier just cause I didn’t have to weight my feet as much. 

My doc said I could start easing into climbing at 5 months. I did start slightly early but I’ve been using pain as my guide and if anything feels weird or not right I’ll back off right away. I’ll post another update in a couple months to let y’all know how it’s doing after I’m fully back to climbing. To anyone going thru this hang in there it’s not so bad once you hit the 2 month mark. Get on the hang board and stay fit and you’ll bounce back even stronger. Good luck y’all 

I am one week on from the repair surgery and along with my physio I am also doing dips, pull ups and hang boarding / no hangs each day. My knee isn't sore at all and I can put weight through it which I am really surprised by. I did manage to also do a round of push ups but struggled to get back to my feet so decided to leave those out of my routine for now. I also figured push ups may not be great for my knee so soon after surgery, even thought they felt fine. I'll run that past my physio next week.

Darren French wrote:

I am one week on from the repair surgery and along with my physio I am also doing dips, pull ups and hang boarding / no hangs each day. My knee isn't sore at all and I can put weight through it which I am really surprised by. I did manage to also do a round of push ups but struggled to get back to my feet so decided to leave those out of my routine for now. I also figured push ups may not be great for my knee so soon after surgery, even thought they felt fine. I'll run that past my physio next week.

You got a meniscus repair, or a meniscectomy? Typically, you’re not supposed to weight bear for at least a month post repair (except maybe toe touch).

Ryan K wrote:

You got a meniscus repair, or a meniscectomy? Typically, you’re not supposed to weight bear for at least a month post repair (except maybe toe touch).

I’ll second this. Went in for scrape ended up with a repair. Woke up after surgery with my leg in the cast and was WTF is going on here. No weight bearing for a month. It was worth it though, the feeling of your knee locking up is one that doesn’t go away that easily. 

Fehim Hasecic wrote:

I’ll second this. Went in for scrape ended up with a repair. Woke up after surgery with my leg in the cast and was WTF is going on here. No weight bearing for a month. It was worth it though, the feeling of your knee locking up is one that doesn’t go away that easily. 

I had the opposite, went in expecting a repair, was fully prepare for 4 weeks non weight bearing and woke up to the news I just had a clean up, that the root was ok!

Ryan K wrote:

You got a meniscus repair, or a meniscectomy? Typically, you’re not supposed to weight bear for at least a month post repair (except maybe toe touch).

I had a repair. I had a brace for 6 weeks which came off last week, I was full weight bearing at 3 weeks. My tear was of the posterior horn so the meniscus was only under strain during flexion so surgeon and PT both agreed walking was fine.

I’m now working on strengthening the leg. Squatting, split squats, wall squats calf raises etc all with light weights. Nothing past 90 degrees.

It feels really good. My surgeon said it was one of his best repairs and he is really good. He is the knee surgeon for Fulham football club in London and has also done the England World Cup rugby team. He’s hot shit in the knee surgery world according to the nurses. Haha

Darren French wrote:

I had a repair. I had a brace for 6 weeks which came off last week, I was full weight bearing at 3 weeks. My tear was of the posterior horn so the meniscus was only under strain during flexion so surgeon and PT both agreed walking was fine.

I’m now working on strengthening the leg. Squatting, split squats, wall squats calf raises etc all with light weights. Nothing past 90 degrees.

It feels really good. My surgeon said it was one of his best repairs and he is really good. He is the knee surgeon for Fulham football club in London and has also done the England World Cup rugby team. He’s hot shit in the knee surgery world according to the nurses. Haha

Makes sense. Sounds great. Good luck with the recovery!